Mike's trucking: Cereal City

PR maestro Mike O'Neill is still trucking-- it's Day Two-- and good thing he's doing so on his own time as he's headed from the Northeast to the Southwest by way of Central Michigan...

Day Two: Playing the Father Card

Today is going to be an easy one. My son and I only need to drive about four-and-a-half hours to reach our next stop-- Battle Creek, Mich., home of the world’s most famous tiger-– Tony.

The International DuraStar from Penske continues to perform admirably. None the less, I’ve decided to play the father card today and the kid will be doing all of the driving. A sore neck and sore lower back, which resulted from yesterday’s driving, was enough for me. I’m not sure I like his driving, though. He tends to hug the right side of the lane in which he is driving. I prefer the left side. I figure it would be better to sideswipe someone on the left rather than falling off a mountain on the right. Is one better than the other? We’re anxious to hear your thoughts.

Traveling through northern Ohio on I-80, I couldn’t help but notice that Ohio turnpike officials (or whoever it is that makes these type of decisions) seem to be far less concerned about construction workers' safety than their counterparts in Pennsylvania. In PA, lanes were blocked for several miles before you even saw a worker.

Follow the hound!

Here in Ohio, it seems like the precautionary lane closures are a matter of yards. And I’m not kidding. We saw one sign that read: “Shoulder Work Ahead” and it was literally about five feet in front of three workers in the middle of a major thoroughfare. Scary!

Okay coming up on another work zone in Ohio, and in the interest of fair blogging, we did get a warning one mile before we saw the cones. Then it was another mile before we saw any workers. Maybe that last group of workers was Democrats. After all we are in the middle of rural Ohio.

Just saw the first signs for Detroit and Ann Arbor. Michigan can’t be far now. We’re going to eventually hit a small part of Indiana on I-80, and then head north on Highway 69 into the Wolverine state. Just a short drive after that on I-94 west, and we’ll only have about ten-plus miles to Cereal City.

Tomorrow begins two days of PR and R&R with the fine folks at Eaton. Then, my man David Kolman comes to town and he actually wants to do all of the driving to Las Vegas. He won't be getting any arguments from me.